June 4, 2011; Source: The Hollywood Reporter | When you see Kim Kardashian’s name in an article headline, you might think of lots of things. In this case, it was Kardashian and others taking the “Hollywood Pledge” to strengthen the commitment of the entertainment community to charity. The effort, with its own website, is a joint venture of the Give Back Hollywood Foundation, The Hollywood Reporter, and the Screen Actors Guild Foundation.
Who do the celebs actually give to? That’s our interest. Here’s a partial list of Hollywood celebrities on the Pledge site and their intended charitable priorities.
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Chris Noth (Law and Order, Sex and the City) to the Rainforest Action Network, Denzel Washington to the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, Fran Drescher (the Nanny) to the Cancer Schmancer Movement, Hugh Jackman (X-Men) to World Vision, The Global Poverty Project, and Harlem Village Academies, Justin Bieber to Children’s Miracle Network Hospital’s Pencils of Promise, Kim Kardashian to Dream Foundation, Laurence Fishburne to Unicef, Leeza Gibbons (television personality) to Leeza’s Place, Richard Gere to the Gere Foundation, Stephen Baldwin to Food for Orphans, and Victoria Principal to Oceana, Greenpeace, and The Earth’s Best Defense.
Admittedly, this NPQ Newswire writer didn’t recognize most of the names on the Pledge list (other than sports figures such as Minnesota Vikings runner Adrian Peterson, not included here because he isn’t necessarily “Hollywood”). It’s probably a generational thing. But it is striking that every celeb seems to be looking for his or her unique connection to a charity, in some cases their own eponymous foundations. The next step for the Pledge is to go beyond the list and the links to the celebs’ Twitter accounts and show us what the celebrities are actually donating from their own pockets.—Rick Cohen